


threes

by Anonymous



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Triad, Angst, F/M, M/M, Original Character(s), Some Humor, mostly follows canon except the au stuff lol
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-06
Updated: 2019-08-06
Packaged: 2020-08-10 10:37:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,692
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20134096
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/
Summary: “You mean it’s true, then? About Muggles and Duos?”“What d'you mean?” Harry asks.“Muggles marry in twos, right?” Ron asks. Harry nods, slowly. “Well, all wizards marry in threes.”





	threes

**Author's Note:**

> -there are other ships in here that are less relevant or not endgame so i didn't tag them  
-there's one (1) ship that's pretty important but i kept it a secret for mystery purposes. if you reaaaallly wanna know i put it in the end notes  
-because this is an au where all wizards are married in 3s, i made up a few ocs--john weasley, arthur & molly's husband. he's cool. also alex, who is whatever gender you want them to be and the spouse of fleur and bill.  
-never mentioned but the malfoy parents are lucius, narcissa, and another woman.  
-hope you enjoy!

one.

-

Ron tells Harry about it on the train ride to Hogwarts, their first year. 

“Your other dad?” Harry repeats, and Ron’s eyes widen.

“You mean it’s true, then? About Muggles and Duos?”

“What d'you mean?” Harry asks. 

“Muggles marry in twos, right?” Ron asks. Harry nods, slowly. “Well, all wizards marry in threes.”

“They  _ what?”  _ Harry asks. 

“They all marry in threes. Usually there’s one girl and one boy at least, but sometimes it’s all one or the other,” Ron explains. “I have a mum and two dads. My one dad works for the Ministry, and the other works in Diagon Alley.”

“Really?” Harry asks. “So everyone here has three parents?”

“Except the Muggle-borns, I’d guess,” Ron says. 

“So  _ I  _ have three parents?” Harry says, thinking that that means there’s a whole extra parent he  _ didn’t know about,  _ and Ron shrugs. 

“That’s the thing, isn’t it?” he says. “Your third parent is a mystery. Nobody knows who they are, or where they went.”

“You mean,” Harry says, his eyes wide. “My third parent could be alive?”

“I guess,” Ron says, and then he opens up another chocolate frog and gets distracted by the card. Harry is left to stare out the window and wonder, imagining a third parent coming to find him, opening their arms and pulling him into a tight hug, and taking him far, far away from the Dursleys forever. 

\----

The Mirror of Erised shows a man who has messy black hair that sticks up just like Harry’s, and a woman with dark red hair and green eyes, and a third person who stands in shadows, their hand holding tight to Lily’s. Their other hand is on Harry’s shoulder, and James ruffles Harry’s hair, and Lily bends down to give his forehead a kiss. 

Harry drinks in James and Lily’s faces, memorizing them, and wishing the third person had any face at all. 

\----

“Professor,” Harry says, when Dumbledore’s getting up to leave from the Hospital Wing. “Do you...do you know who my third parent is?”

“Sadly,” Dumbledore says. “I do not.”

And then he leaves, and Harry lays back down on his pillow, exhausted. 

\----

two.

-

Harry met Ron’s mum trying to get into the station first year, but he meets her properly when she comes outside the Burrow to yell at Ron, Fred, and George. 

He meets Ron’s first dad when he comes home from the Ministry. 

“Arthur,” Molly says, her voice dangerous. “Your sons have been driving that car across London.”

“We needed to rescue Harry!” Ron cries, and Arthur says, “Really? How’d it go?”

“Arthur,” says another voice, and Harry looks up to see yet another red-headed man come into the room, Ginny trailing behind him. “It’s been years, please learn to read Molly’s tone.”

“Sorry,” Arthur says. “I mean, boys, that was very wrong of you. Very wrong.”

Ron’s other dad is named John, and works in an ice cream shop at Diagon Alley. He’s a Muggle-born, like Hermione, and he has a large, soft presence about him. Ginny, who seems to be afraid of Harry, likes to hide behind him. 

John and Molly give equally good hugs, Harry decides when they find him after his little journey to Knockturn Alley. Arthur’s is good too, but not  _ as  _ good. 

\----

three. 

-

Before Harry’s third year, he flips through the photo album Hagrid gave him and looks for a wedding picture of his parents. Maybe the third one is there, in the wedding party?

He finds pictures from Hogwarts, James and Lily in matching red and gold. He finds a Quidditch picture of his dad, and a picture of his parents with him as a baby, no third parent in sight. There’s a picture of his dad, still at Hogwarts, with three other boys, his arms thrown around the two on either side of him. 

There’s space in the back for more pictures, but unless one of those three school friends of James is his second father, then Harry gets nothing. 

\----

“Don’t you know?” McGonagall says, and she cants her voice down to a whisper. Harry has to strain to hear. “They say Sirius Black was really Sirius  _ Potter.”  _

No. No. 

It can’t be true. The man who betrayed his parents--the man who killed twelve people, including one of his best friends--he can’t be Harry’s dad. He can’t. 

Harry runs out of the Three Broomsticks and ignores Ron and Hermione calling after him. He remembers, now, the dark-haired boy next to his father, in the Hogwarts picture, the one with his arm around James. Was that Sirius?

Is that Harry’s dad?

\----

“D’you know who my other parent is, then?” Harry asks, sitting on the floor of his Defense Against the Dark Arts classroom, looking up at Professor Lupin. Lupin is sitting on top of the trunk that the boggart is kept in. 

“I have my suspicions, of course,” Lupin says. “I’ve always had them. But...I don’t know for sure. I think...after all this time…the only person who would know must be the third parent themself.”

\----

Harry’s surprised that he doesn’t yell anything about Mum Or Dad #2 while he’s screaming at Sirius, and then he’s glad, because after Sirius asks him to come live with him, Harry says, “Sirius….you aren’t my third parent, are you?”

“No,” Sirius says, sighing. “For a while, sixth year, I thought it’d turn out to be me, but James was set on Lily, and I’ve never been too fond of witches. I’m just your godfather.”

“But...if you were so close to them, do you know who it is?” Harry asks, desperately. 

“No,” Sirius says. “And they were so good at hiding, you would’ve thought they went Muggle, only did a Duo. But...they’d mention their third, sometimes. Fond. Whoever it was, James and Lily loved them very much.”

Harry mulls on this, decides it’s good enough.

“I would like to come live with you, even if you aren’t my dad,” Harry says, and Sirius brings his arm around Harry’s shoulders and ruffles his hair, grinning. 

“Maybe we can figure it out together,” he says, and Harry smiles right back. 

\----

four.

-

“Potter,” McGonagall says. “As Champion, you will be expected to do the first dance, which means you will need to have dates.”

Harry feels his eyes widen. 

“Dates?” he repeats, choked, and McGonagall nods severely. 

“Dates,” she says, final, and Harry wishes, for the first time ever, this was the Muggle world, and he could just go with one person.

\----

Harry follows Cho up to the Owlrey. Not to be creepy, or anything, he just wants to talk to her alone.

“Will you go to the Yule Ball with me?” Harry asks, pretty sure that after this he can just bring Ron or one of Cho’s friends as his third. 

“Oh,” Cho says, looking surprised. “Well, I’m already going with Cedric, and we don’t have a third yet but are two Champions even allowed to go together?”

Harry flounders, unsure of this development. So...Cho would be fine with going with him? Is he hearing that right?

“I could ask?” he offers, and Cho smiles a little. 

“Okay,” she says. “I’ll tell Cedric.”

\----

“Do you have a third?” Hermione asks, and Victor looks startled. 

“I haf no friends at Durmstrang,” he says. “You pick.”

“Oh,” Hermione says, and she thinks of Ron. Her face feels warm, but she pushes away whatever  _ that  _ is to imagine Ron dancing with Victor at the Ball. “Okay.”

\----

“Is this a friend thing, or should we ask another person?” Ginny asks, her knees drawn up to her chest. She’s in her pajamas on a couch in the Common Room. It’s late, and Ginny is fairly sure Neville didn’t mean to ask her to the Ball when he’d started this conversation. 

“I mean,” Neville starts, and then he blushes. “Do you have anyone in mind?”

“Um,” Ginny says, pretending to think, and then reminding herself that she’s a Gryffindor for a reason. “We could ask Harry? Just, you know, cause he  _ needs  _ dates and probably doesn’t have one.”

“Okay,” Neville says. “Sure.”

\----

Ginny and Neville dance together at the Ball, and Ginny keeps looking at Harry, who’s dancing with  _ Cedric  _ and  _ Cho.  _ Both of whom, by the way, are  _ older  _ and probably just think Harry’s some little kid to entertain or whatever, and it’s probably more like a puppy situation. Or at least that what she’s trying to convince herself of. 

She looks away and focuses on Ron and Krum and Hermione instead. Ron looks like he’s been punched upside the head, Krum looks constipated, and Hermione looks pleased. 

Ginny steps on Neville’s toe again. 

“Sorry!” she says, and she looks back at him. 

“It’s okay,” he says. “It’s only fair, since I’ve stepped on your toes, too.”

Ginny wants to apologize again, but she doesn’t know how to say that he deserves attention that she’s not giving him. She’s trying to work it out, but then a snide voice says, “So what, Weasley, being a blood traitor isn’t enough? You have to date like a Muggle too?”

Ginny turns to face Malfoy, who has Parkinson on one arm and Zabini on the other. 

“Just because  _ you  _ have to be flashy and bring dates you don’t care about doesn’t mean  _ I  _ do,” Ginny retorts, and Neville says, “Yeah, maybe you should try having friends for a change.”

Malfoy flushes and Zabini drags him away. Ginny turns back to Neville. 

“That was brilliant,” she says. 

“Thanks,” Neville says, his face red. “You too.”

\----

“I am so  _ sick  _ of that old bat,” Hermione says ruthlessly, slamming the  _ Prophet  _ onto the table. 

“Give it a rest, Hermione,” Ron moans, and Harry peers over Hermione’s shoulder at the article in question. 

“Skeeter’s spent the entire term accusing us of illicitly dating,” Harry says. “This isn’t new, is it?”

“No, but now she’s involving  _ Victor.”  _ As always when Krum is mentioned, Ron’s face goes red. “She’s saying that either he’s stolen us from you or you treat us so horribly that we wanted to escape so we went to the Ball with him. Or I’m a dangerous slut who has a thing for Quidditch players and I’ve got Ron under my spell.”

Hermione sounds distraught, and Harry pats her shoulder. 

“Nobody really thinks that,” he says. Hermione does not look reassured. 

\---

Harry never meant to get  _ feelings  _ for Cedric but he did, even though Cedric was probably just humoring him and Cho. 

But now--now it doesn’t matter, and Harry will never know. He’s in the hospital wing, crying, his arm bandaged and Voldemort is  _ back  _ and Cedric is  _ dead  _ and Cho comes in, her eyes puffy and red and she sits on the bed next to Harry, holding his hand tight. They cry together. 

\----

five. 

-

“Who’s Cedric, your  _ boyfriend _ ?” Dudley asks, and Harry has never been violent before, but he almost punches him. 

\----

_ Can I visit you?  _ Neville writes. Ginny’s fist clenches. 

_ No,  _ she has to write back.  _ I really, really wish you could.  _

Neville had told her, last year, what happened to his parents, and so she knows he’d be all for this Order business, but they won’t even let Harry join, let alone Neville, and besides, it’s not like  _ she’s  _ the Secret-Keeper. She can’t tell him where she is, anyway. 

\----

Cho is mad at Harry because he didn’t visit her over the summer. Harry doesn’t know how to tell her about the Order, so they don’t talk besides one fight until that day at the Hog’s Head, and she lingers to tell him she’s sorry, and then she holds his hand back to the castle.

\----

“I mean, I dunno what you expected, mate,” Ron says later, when Harry’s brooding by the fire. “If you don’t date in Trios then it’s bound to fall apart.”

Harry says nothing, just crosses his arms tighter and looks harder at the orange flames, hoping they will yield some unknown secrets. 

Ginny throws a pillow at Ron. 

“Hey!” he protests. “What?”

“Tosser,” she says. “Twos  _ can  _ work sometimes.” She looks at Neville, who is sitting on the floor next to her chair, working on an essay. “They just suck ass if you  _ had  _ a Third, then lost one.”

Harry nods in miserable agreement, and Ron rubs his head, where she hit him. 

“Whatever,” he says. 

\----

The memory Harry sees in the Pensive leaves him rattled. 

First off, did his mum really hate James like that? Harry finds it hard to imagine them ever getting together. 

Second, for a brief moment Harry had thought he would be able to see his third parent. Even though everyone else didn’t know, Harry was sure he’d know them when he saw them. 

But--no.

The memory is terrible, and Harry wishes he could take it out of his own mind, wishes that the Occlumency had actually amounted to anything. But instead, Snape kicks him out, and Harry is left alone with his thoughts and Snape’s memory. 

\----

six.

-

“Ginny,” Neville says, nearly knocking into her in the halls. “Ginny, I understand now.”

“What are you on about?” she asks, grabbing his arms to steady herself. 

“All the--the hero worship of Harry, and your old crush on him,  _ I get it,”  _ Neville says, giddy and Ginny blinks. 

“What?”

“We were in Potions, and he said--to Professor Snape-- _ ‘There’s no need to call me ‘sir’, Professor’. _ ”

\----

With Quidditch comes a lot of things, like Harry’s newfound attention to Ginny, and Ron’s newfound attachments as well. 

Lavender and Pavarti seem incapable of going four seconds without touching Ron; they always walk around clutching his arms like they’ll float away if he doesn’t ground them. There’s quite a bit of snogging, and Harry’s worried for Ron’s ego and Hermione’s hands, because she keeps breaking things. 

“You alright, mate?” Harry asks her, after she’s spelled away the remains of her ink bottle. They’re in the common room, and across from them Lavender is giving Ron a shoulder massage while Pavarti is sitting in his lap, whispering with him. 

“Ron is at perfect liberty to snog whomever he likes,” Hermione growls. “Even if they  _ live _ with me and never shut up about him.”

\----

Harry reminds himself, while he’s hiding in the bathroom from Romilda Vane, that he’s only even bothering with this bloody Christmas party because of the Horcruxes. 

“Alright, Harry?” a voice asks and Harry turns to see Neville washing his hands and watching him. 

“Oh, yeah, just--Romilda Vane and her friend are trying to seduce me,” Harry says. “I need a date to that stupid party so she can get off my back.”

“Well,” Neville asks, his face pink all of a sudden. “You could--I mean--do you want to go with me and Ginny?”

“What?” Harry repeats, his heart doing backflips at the mention of Ginny. “I thought you were going out with Dean?”

“Oh,” Neville says, his face more red than pink, “Dean wasn’t willing to give up Seamus, and Ginny wasn’t willing to give up--me. So that’s...over. Yeah.”

“Huh,” Harry says. “And, uh, yes, I would love to go with you and Ginny. If it’s, er, okay with her.”

“Okay,” Neville says, scooting towards the door. His face is bright red and Harry’s pretty sure his own face matches. “I’ll let her know.”

“Thanks,” Harry says, and Neville nods once before he leaves the bathroom. 

Harry buries his face in his hands, trying to regain his breathing. 

\----

“You brought  _ Smith  _ and  _ McLaggen?” _ Harry asks, incredulous. Hermione’s face is red. 

“I thought they would annoy Ron the most,” she says. “But they’re both  _ awful.”  _

“I could’ve told you that,” Ginny says. She’s standing so close to Harry that they’re  _ almost _ touching, and Harry is hyperaware of the distance between them. 

Hermione wails and Neville says, “Heads up, I think I see Smith coming this way.” 

“Merlin,” Hermione says, and she vanished as if she’d Apparated away. Smith elbows his way through the crowd, McLaggen right behind him. 

“Have you seen Granger?” McLaggen asks. 

“No,” Harry says. McLaggen looks like he doesn’t believe him. 

“I haven’t seen Hermione all night,” Ginny says. “Right, Nev?” 

“Yeah, we’ve just—we’ve been here, with Harry,” Neville says. Smith rolls his eyes. 

“Come on,” he says, and the pair leave, shoving their way through the space. 

Harry feels rather like he’s missed a bullet; he laughs in relief, Neville and Ginny laughing with him. 

\----

Harry pulls out the Map and opens it up, lighting his wand. 

“What are you doing?” Neville asks, pulling back the curtain to sit on Harry’s bed with him. Harry scoots obligingly, pointing his wand at the Map. 

“Looking for Malfoy,” he says. “He keeps vanishing from the Map, and I think he’s up to something.” 

“Can I help?” Neville asks, and Harry shrugs and nods. Neville lays on his stomach next to Harry, and they scour the Map together. 

They don’t find Malfoy, and Harry goes over it a second time before he notes Neville’s snoring. He turns his head to see Neville’s fallen asleep on his arm. Harry could levitate Neville back to his own bed, but he doesn’t want to disturb him. 

So Harry puts the Map away, extinguishes his wand, and drags his pillow from the head of the bed down to the foot, and he lays next to Neville, finding some sleep as well. 

\----

Dumbledore gives Harry permission to tell Ron and Hermione about the Horcruxes, and every day Harry thinks about telling Neville, about telling Ginny. 

But Harry has to keep them safe, and they’d be safer not knowing. 

\----

The  _ avada kedavra  _ lets loose Dumbledore’s spell on Harry, and he moves, his legs weak. Snape whirls around, his wand pointed at the wall. 

“Potter!” he roars. “Take Malfoy and get out of here. GO ON!”

Harry doesn’t know why he’s listening to Snape, doesn’t know why he’d listen to a murderer, but he reaches out from under the Cloak and grabs Draco’s hand, tugging him under and  _ running.  _

Draco blasts the barricade away from the stairwell, and they run around Death Eaters, firing jinxes and hexes. 

Everything is hectic, and somehow Harry is outside, Draco and Ron and Hermione and Neville and Ginny hot on his heels, the Cloak shoved under Harry’s arm. Harry’s lungs hurt from running but he keeps pushing until they’re beyond the grounds, and Harry grabs Draco and Ginny’s hands. 

“Come on,” he pants. “We have to--Apparate--the Burrow--”

Ginny can’t Apparate and only Draco and Hermione have a license. Hermione’s face is twisted in concern but she grabs Ginny’s other hand, and they turn into the suffocating darkness.

“What happened?” Hermione cries when they land, whole, outside the Burrow. “Why do you have Malfoy?”

“Dumbledore….” Harry says, his voice choking on a sob. “He’s…”

“What? Is he hurt?” Ginny asks, eyes wide.

“He’s dead,” Draco says, his voice dull, and there is not much more talking, the rest of the night. 

The Burrow is empty, everyone else having gone to fight. They settle in the family room and Draco doesn’t say anything scathing about the decor or the state of the place. 

“Snape saved me,” Draco says, his voice dull. “The Dark Lord would’ve killed me for not managing to do it.”

“Why would Snape do that?” Harry asks. Snape, Harry’s least favorite teacher, a murderer and a savior. 

Draco shrugs miserably. 

Five Patronuses come through the window. They are all silver cats, and when they open their mouths they have McGonagall’s voice. 

“Harry--”

“Hermione--”

“Ron--”

“Ginny--”

“Neville--”

“I hope you are all together and safe. The Death Eaters have left Hogwarts and the Weasleys are very worried about all of you. There have been some injuries and one death...Professor Dumbledore. We don’t know what happened, and hope that Mr. Potter has some insight. Please send word of your wellbeing shortly.”

The cats vanish, after having said the last part at the same time. Harry raises his wand. With immense effort, he concentrates on Ginny and Neville, pressed on his sides. 

“ _ Expecto Patronum!”  _

The stag bursts forth, and Harry looks at it blankly. 

“Just tell it where to go,” Hermione says. “It’ll talk on it’s own.”

“Right,” Harry says. “Hogwarts, then.”

The stag nods, and leaps out the window, vanishing into the night air. 

\----

seven.

-

Neville is at Bill and Fleur and Alex’s wedding, and Harry can’t stop staring. 

He broke it off, with Neville and Ginny, but...it’s not like he  _ wanted  _ to. Neville’s dress robes are nice, and fit him well, and Ginny looks radiant. Harry forces himself to look away from them, from where they’re dancing. 

Instead, he watches Hermione, Ron and Draco dance. Draco has been staying at the Burrow, since that’s the most protection the Order has to offer. He’s not going to be returning to school, and the Order is trying to contact his mother to move her, as well. 

Ever since the end of their sixth year, Draco has been quiet and subdued in a way he normally isn’t, which Harry thinks is the only reason why Ron is dancing with him at all. 

The lynx comes in through the window, and Harry runs to find Ron and Hermione, and it’s only after they’ve Apparated away that he realizes they’ve taken Draco with them. 

\----

Hermione screams and cries because Ron has taken Draco with him, they’ve left together, and her heart aches and aches and she hadn’t even  _ known  _ what she felt for Draco until he was gone, and Harry wraps his arms around her and lets her sob.

\----

Harry kneels by James and Lily’s grave and touches the words that carve out  _ Potter.  _ Who buried them? Who laid them to rest, who carved these words on their grave?

Why weren’t they there, with him and James and Lily? Who is his third parent?

The questions are old and once burned, now they rise dully inside him, a reminder of all he doesn’t know. 

He stands. 

“Let’s go, come on,” he says, and Hermione nods, and follows him away. 

\----

“What happened,” Hermione says coldly, her eyes narrow. 

Harry and Ron are dripping wet, and Draco’s arm is wrapped around Ron, who has the sword slung over his shoulder and the broken locket in his other hand. 

“There was a doe,” Harry says.

“And she went to this pond thing, and then Harry jumped inside, see, and so--”

“Typical  _ bloody  _ Gryffindors,” Draco says. “Ron jumped in after him--clothed, though, because  _ apparently  _ Ron’s not entirely  _ mad _ \--”

“And then Ron pulled me out of the pond, because the locket knew I was by the sword, which was in the pond, by the way--”

“And then Harry opened the locket, and, um.” Ron falters and exchanges a look with Harry and Draco. Harry shrugs.

“The locket put up a bit of a fight, and then Ron killed it,” he says. 

“Also, we’re back,” Draco adds, and Hermione’s eyes narrow. Her arms tighten across her chest.

“A doe?” she repeats, turning back to Harry. 

“Yeah, a Patronus,” Harry says. 

“Do you realize what this could mean?” Hermione asks. 

“What?” Ron asks. Hermione ignores him. 

“If your patronus is a stag because of your father, then perhaps--perhaps it was your third parent.”

\----

Dobby Apparates Hermione and Ron to Shell Cottage, where Draco and Harry had escaped to a few hours before. Bill was trying to ready the Order, but when Harry sees them down below he gives a shout and runs outside, towards his friends.

Strangely, Dobby has Luna and Dean and Ollivander and a Goblin, as well. Harry wants to ask what happened, but when he sees how white Ron is, and how Hermione trembles, he decides he’d rather not know.

\----

Ariana Dumbledore’s portrait swings open, and Neville is on the other side, bruised and bloody and wholly, beautifully alive, and Harry runs for him, taking him in his arms. 

Neville is holding Harry as much as Harry holds him, and they kiss and kiss and Harry says, “I thought--you weren’t on the Map, and I thought you were  _ dead,  _ oh Neville,” and Neville says, “I’ve been in the Room of Requirement, silly, Harry--”

Ron and Hermione and Draco and Alberforth let them have their moment, although Alberforth grumbles.

\----

Harry kneels next to Snape, unsure of what to think or feel, and Snape seems so unsurprised to see him there.

“Take them,” Snape croaks, and blue memory-tears fall down his face. “Take them.”

Harry gathers them, unwilling to deny a dying man this, and then Snape says, “You look...so much….like them.”

And then he dies, and Harry stands up, his least favorite teacher’s blood on his pants.

\----

Harry pours the memories into the Pensive and bends over.

\--

_ A little girl with red hair, a boy in oversized Muggle clothes.  _

_ “You’re a witch!” he says, happily, and she looks offended.  _

_ \--- _

_ “What’s this?” Severus asks, staring suspiciously at the flowers under his nose. James Potter smiles winningly.  _

_ “I’m not daft, I know you and Evans are a package deal. So if I want to woo her, I’ve gotta woo you, as well.” _

_ Severus’s face grows red. He accepts the flowers.  _

_ \--- _

_ “Gryffindors? Really?” Avery asks in their dorm room.  _

_ “Leave me be,” Severus spits.  _

_ \--- _

_ Lily’s kiss is searing, blinding, everything.  _

_ \--- _

_ “I am so sorry to ask this of you,” Dumbledore says, asking his first impossible favor. Severus clenches his fists, stares at the floor.  _

_ “Fine,” he says. “I’ll do it.” _

_ \--- _

_ “We’ve gotta break up,” Severus says, pacing. “Not for real, but--everyone’s gotta think I wanna be a ‘Death Eater’ or whatever shit it is.” _

_ “Okay,” Lily says, her face pale. “I have an idea.” _

_ \--- _

_ “I don’t need help from a filthy little Mudblood like her!” Severus spits, and Lily’s face shutters and closes, just like they’d rehearsed. _

_ \--- _

_ Severus’s left forearm burns, and he bites his tongue hard enough to draw blood and does not scream, and the Dark Lord laughs above him.  _

_ \--- _

_ James traces the Mark with careful fingers. Severus flinches.  _

_ “Okay?” James asks.  _

_ “Just--sensitive,” Severus says. “Keep going.” _

_ \--- _

_ “Severus,” James says. “Lily. Will you marry me?” _

_ \--- _

_ Severus  _ Potter. 

_ \--- _

_ “The Dark Lord, he thinks it means  _ them!  _ James and Lily--my spouses--my son!” _

_ “We will protect them,” Dumbledore says. “Not to worry, Severus, not to worry--” _

_ \--- _

_ Severus cries, holds Harry tight. He doesn’t understand what happened, where the Dark Lord went, but Harry has a scar on his forehead, and James and Lily are dead.  _

_ \---- _

_ Severus spits at Harry and ridicules him, because that is what is expected of him. Severus is not a nice person, but it is so hard to be mean to his son. _

_ \---- _

_ Every time Harry is hurt, Severus visits the hospital wing, keeping vigil while Harry sleeps.  _

_ \---- _

_ Severus lays dying, and he thinks of Lily, and James, and Harry appears, and Severus’s pain eases.  _

_ He has been so cruel to his son, but crucial to the war. He hates himself, and deserves this death. He doesn’t deserve for Harry to be here, to be allowed to see him one last time. _

_ But soon--soon Severus will see James, and Lily again. And Harry will die, and Severus will see him, too.  _

_ \---- _

Harry draws out of the Pensieve, and he stands up, steady on his feet. He goes down, and kisses the Snitch open. 

He turns the Stone three times. 

Sirius, and Remus, and James, and Lily, and Severus. 

“You’ve been so brave,” Lily says. 

“It’s almost over,” James says. 

“Quicker and easier than falling asleep,” Sirius says. 

“The world will be a better place,” Remus says. 

“Son,” Severus says. “We will see you soon.”

\----

eight.

-

Harry lays in Ginny’s bed, at the Burrow. She’s nestled next to him, her head tucked under his chin. 

Something moves from behind him, and weight is added to the bed. Harry shifts closer to the wall, trying not to disturb his sleeping girlfriend. 

Weight shifts again, and an arm is flung across Harry’s middle. 

“We made it,” Neville says, his voice so tired and full of relief. 

“We did,” Harry says, and he closes his eyes. “We really did.”

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


**Author's Note:**

> snape/james/lily. that's the ship.
> 
> \-----
> 
> thanks for reading & please drop a comment, let me know what you thought!
> 
> my tumblr is @pudditch, if you wanna drop by!


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